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It’s not time for the Los Angeles Clippers to trade star big man DeAndre Jordan…at least not yet.

DeAndre Jordan has been one of the hottest names in the NBA trade rumor mill early on this season. Due to the Los Angeles Clippers’ rough start, his name has come up often in rumors. Despite all the buzz surrounding Jordan, the Clippers should not trade their star center just yet.

It has been yet another rough season for the Clippers from an injury perspective. Blake Griffin once again missed a chunk of games due to an injury, but is back on the court. L.A. has also seen Patrick Beverley, Milos Teodosic, Danilo Gallinari and Austin Rivers struggle with nagging injuries.

Even with all of the injury woes, the Clippers have won six of their last seven games and are back in playoff contention with a 17-19 record.

They may not have had the start that they were hoping for, but that was to be expected even before the injury bug bit. Chris Paul was traded in the offseason, which was going to take some time to get used to. It seems that the team is finally jelling and ready to play to its full potential.

Jordan has been a big part of the Clippers’ success in recent weeks and has had a solid season overall. He has averaged 11.1 points per game to go along with 15.1 rebounds and over a block per game. His scoring average hasn’t been as high as some would like, but the defensive impact he makes overall is too great to lose.
Why the Clippers shouldn’t trade Jordan

Trading Jordan would impact the Clippers negatively in many areas. Rebounding would take a major dive, while the rim protection would become nearly nonexistent.

Jordan has been one of the league’s elite rim protectors throughout his career, averaging 1.8 blocks per game throughout his 10 seasons in Los Angeles. Even this season, despite the low block average, Jordan has been able to alter shots and bail out the perimeter defenders when their man has gotten past them.

Doc Rivers may not have the strong championship contender from the start he had in years past with Paul, Griffin and Jordan forming a Big Three, but the Clippers are finding their groove. Breaking up the core would immediately ruin any chance at a postseason run down the stretch.

L.A. has put together a very talented roster even with the loss of Paul. It was able to bring in talented rotation players like Lou Williams, Milos Teodosic, Sam Dekker and Gallinari. They may not have “star power” like Paul had, but the team as a whole has the potential to be very deadly in the postseason if they can remain healthy.

If the Clippers were to trade Jordan, it would signal a rebuild in Los Angeles. That is something that Griffin, who signed a massive five-year, $173 million contract in the offseason, might not want to stick around to be a part of. Making Griffin unhappy by trading Jordan isn’t a road that the Clippers want to go down at this point.
What is the alternative?

Quite simply, the Clippers must keep their core intact and ride out the rest of the season. If they are unable to continue playing quality basketball over the next few weeks, perhaps Rivers should explore the trade market for Jordan right before the trade deadline.

Giving up on the season this early would be a big mistake for Los Angeles. They are currently the No. 9 seed in the Western Conference and are just 2.5 games out of fifth place in the standings.

Jordan is a very important piece of the Clippers’ core, both now and for the future. Hanging onto him and seeing what the remainder of the season has in store would be the wise move, even if he does opt out of the final year of his contract to hit unrestricted free agency this summer.

Los Angeles must hold onto Jordan. The rumors may be flying, but the Clippers should not pull the trigger on a trade just yet.v

Welcome to Buzz City Beat, a daily roundup of the best articles from around the internet surrounding the Charlotte Hornets.

Despite dealing with a dislocated finger, Dwight Howard had one of his best games of the season and led his side to victory over the Milwaukee Bucks. In this edition of Buzz City Beat, we look at what the next step is for the Charlotte Hornets, how Kemba Walker continues to excel with a non-contender and the Greensboro Swarm losing to the Lakeland Magic.
What is the Charlotte Hornets’ next step? (HoopsRumors.com)

Still, it’s not clear what Plan B in Charlotte is. Unlike fellow 11-win teams like the Kings, Suns, and Lakers, the Hornets don’t have a plethora of promising young players they can focus on developing with things going south.

It’s unclear what the best move is for Charlotte going forward. They will have to choose between either re-tooling or completely rebuilding by tanking. Whatever the case may be, it’s clear that changes are needed as what they are doing now isn’t working. With Rich Cho in the final year of his deal, the Hornets will probably look to re-tool by improving their current squad in an attempt to make a playoff push int he second half of the season.

Although, if they continue to struggle for long enough, tanking might look more appealing and a rebuild may be their only option. If Charlotte is still near the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings, their best bet is to cut salary and acquire draft picks/young talent. We’ll have to wait and see what the Hornets’ plan of attack is for the remainder of the season because right now, they don’t have a clear Plan B. What do you think the team should do?
Kemba continues to excel in relative obscurity (UPROXX.com)

Walker isn’t the first, nor the last, legitimate NBA star to languish in anonymity, which comes with the territory when dealing with a sub-.500 team in a market that does not generate national interest on its own. Still, it has to be emphasized, that Walker isn’t the problem in Charlotte, nor is there any real optimism for a future without him should he choose to leave in free agency at the conclusion of the 2018-2019 season.

No matter how bad the Hornets have been over the past few years, Walker has always been a constant positive for the team. Despite all of his individual success, the all-star point guard has yet to win a playoff series in his two trips to the postseason. Kemba’s 3-8 record in only 11 playoff games can largely be attributed to the teams around him rather than his individual play.

If Walker played on a team that was consistently in the playoffs or at least was in a bigger market, he would not only get more recognition but also be one of the more popular players in the league. Whether it be in Charlotte or not, hopefully, Kemba can play on a contender one day. In order to increase their chances of keeping Walker long-term, the Hornets will need to prove that they can build a winning team around him over the next couple years.
Greensboro falls to Lakeland despite 31 points from Goodwin (Gleague.NBA.com)

The Greensboro Swarm (7-12) and Lakeland Magic (13-5) went back-and-forth but it was the Magic’s 8-0 run to close the game that sealed a, 106-102, Swarm defeat. Lakeland has won seven straight games.

Just when it looked like the Swarm were about to turn their season around, they are only 2-3 in their last five. Greensboro still has three games left before the new year and if they can win all three, they could move into the top-8 in the Eastern Conference. If Archie Goodwin continues to play well, this team could be in line for more wins going forward.

TORONTO — As good as the Toronto Raptors are — and make no mistake, this team is very good — it’s performances like Sunday’s against the Sacramento Kings that will always give even the most glass-half-full optimists pause and add more fuel to the naysayers’ ever-burning bonfire.

Toronto looks like everything that should garner more high-profile U.S national attention. This is a team that features two all-stars and, coming into Sunday’s game, was the third best team in the league according to net rating (just behind the likes of championship-favourites Golden State and Houston).

So they’re awesome, right?

Well, when you allow a lottery-bound Kings club to hang 63 points on you while shooting 61.9 per cent from the field at halftime it’s hard to really justify that statement with any sort of emphatic fervour.

Despite those alarming numbers, the Raptors did get their act together in the third quarter and clamped down on the Kings, holding them to 14 points in the frame, riding the momentum of a 12-4 run to end the third to a convincing 108-93 victory.

“We picked it up aggressively — very aggressively,” said DeMar DeRozan, who finished with a game-high 21 points, of the Raptors’ second-half turnaround. “Especially the bench. I think I was in there with a couple of guys off the bench and they came in with high energy, got their hands on the basketball, got out in transition.”

The second unit was indeed key on Sunday for Toronto’s fortunes as the combination of Delon Wright and Fred VanVleet helped helped the Raptors hold Sacramento to just 30.8 per cent shooting in the entire second half.

“I just think we got more locked into the game plan, understanding what they were trying to do,” Toronto point guard Kyle Lowry said. “We just did a better job of being focused on what we needed to do, changed a few things at the half and fixed the coverages a little.”

New Orleans Pelicans All-Star forward Anthony Davis has been diagnosed with a left adductor strain, the team announced Monday.

An MRI of his injured groin and further examination revealed no structural damage, and the timetable for his return will be day-to-day.

Davis missed Saturday’s game at Portland and will miss Monday night’s game against the Golden State Warriors.

Davis was on the court wearing team warm-up gear before the Pelicans played the Warriors. He said he has not resumed basketball activities.

“I just want to be part of the team. I haven’t done any basketball stuff yet,” Davis said. “I want to make sure that the pain has really gone away, especially since all I did was jump and it kind of killed me.”

He was seen using crutches Saturday night in Portland.

“It’s really hard to explain, but something I never felt before,” Davis said, adding that the crutches were a precaution while doctors were still trying to determine the precise nature of his injury.

“It’s good that they’re not finding anything, obviously,” Davis added. “That pain is still there when I do certain movements, so when that kind of subsides, then I’ll start moving forward.”

“Very much so,” Gentry said. “The fact that he’s day-to-day, I think is great. We’ll just work him out, rehab him and see where he is every day. Hopefully [his return] is sooner more so than later, but we’re still not going to take any chances.”

“When it’s a noncontact injury, you always worry about the severity of it,” Gentry said. “The fact that it wasn’t — we all had everything crossed that we own. The fact that it isn’t and he’s going to hopefully play soon is refreshing to us.”

Davis has averaged 25 points and 11 rebounds a game for the Pelicans, who are 12-11 and only one game out of sixth place in the Western Conference playoff chase.

Davis, a four-time All-Star, was injured on a noncontact play in the fourth quarter of Friday night’s loss to the Utah Jazz. Without Davis, New Orleans defeated Portland on Saturday behind DeMarcus Cousins’ 38 points.

Davis had been the Western Conference’s Player of the Week with an average of 25 points, 11 rebounds on 57 percent shooting for the Pelicans.

The Pelicans have home games against the Denver Nuggets on Wednesday, Sacramento Kings on Friday and Philadelphia 76ers on Sunday.

The Charlotte Hornets’ top draft pick was benched in favor of Michael Carter-Williams after the team lost six straight games.

Steve Clifford chose to bench his star rookie because he needed more defense. After losing six straight games, he chose not to play Malik Monk a single minute against the Los Angeles Clippers. The Charlotte Hornets‘ head coach said that “It’s not Malik’s fault, it’s just his position; [Michael Carter-Williams is] a difference-maker defensively.” (CharlotteObserver.com)

This was the first time this year that the 11th overall pick in the 2017 NBA Draft didn’t play in a game for Charlotte. He saw at least nine minutes in the Hornets’ first 14 games of the season. In a surprising turn of events, Monk has fallen out of the team’s rotation while second-round pick Dwayne Bacon is still getting important minutes off of the bench.

The Kentucky product saw 19.8 minutes per game was averaging 8.8 points, 1.9 assists and 1.9 rebounds. He’s been struggling to find his shot shooting only 34.6% from the field and 33.3% from the three-point line. His lack of offensive production hasn’t been enough to overshadow his poor defensive play.

Monk’s defense was a big question mark coming out of college. His size is making him a bit of a liability on that end of the floor. To try and cover up his defensive woes, Coach Clifford was playing Malik at point guard so that he wouldn’t be forced to cover bigger shooting guards. That worked while Michael Carter-Williams was out rehabbing from offseason knee procedures but now that MCW is back, it looks like the rookie has fallen out of the rotation.

Even though the 19-year old is struggling, it isn’t out of the norm for a rookie to have a rough start at the professional level. Even Lonzo Ball, who was the second overall pick, is having his fair share of problems in the NBA. It takes time for most first-year players to adjust to the speed and style of the league.

It will be interesting to see if this trend continues going forward. If the hamstring injury that Jeremy Lamb suffered against the Clippers keeps him sidelined, it could mean a return to the rotation for Monk. At some point, you’d have to think that Malik will earn his minutes back.

It’s far too early to completely give up on such a promising rookie but for the time being, the Hornets need win games and Steve Clifford is electing to go with defense over offense. So until Malik improves his play on that end of the court or Charlotte’s defense as a whole gets better, it’s unlikely that he will see significant minutes anytime soon.

With Elfrid Payton still out with a hamstring injury, Vogel started Jonathon Simmons at point guard instead of Shelvin Mack.

Simmons is a natural swingman, so he’s not ideally suited to run an offense. That said, Simmons is the Magic’s best perimeter defender. At 6-feet-6, Simmons was the Magic’s best bet to slow down Irving and disrupt the pick-and-roll combination of Irving and Horford.

Simmons picked up two fouls within the game’s first 4 minutes, 25 seconds. That foul trouble forced Vogel to sub out Simmons for Mack. On the ensuing play, Irving scored on a driving layup with Mack defending.

Simmons played just 21 minutes because of his foul trouble. In that time, he scored 14 points with one assist.

“When you’re shorthanded at one position and you have a plan to your guy, Simms, at [point guard] for pretty big minutes and he’s in foul trouble the whole night, obviously it changes things a lot,” Vogel said.

Vogel made no other changes to the starting lineup, which included Terrence Ross, Evan Fournier, Aaron Gordon and Nikola Vucevic.

Payton returned to full-contact practice on Saturday, but he still missed his eighth consecutive game Sunday.

Team officials want Payton to heal fully before he plays again.

The schedule should help the Magic, who won’t play again until they host the New York Knicks on Wednesday.

“Elfrid Payton looked really good in practice [Saturday],” Vogel said. “The hamstring was still a little tight afterwards — enough to give us some concern not to push through it just yet. We’ve got a tough stretch coming up where we’ve got eight of 10 on the road and we have two days behind this game to make sure it’s fully behind him. So we’re going to give him one more game.”

D.J. Augustin missed his second consecutive game because of a strained left hamstring.

Irving finished with just 11 points on 4-of-13 shooting and five assists.
Happy for Mack

Mack knows Celtics coach Brad Stevens well.

Stevens coached Mack at Butler University. Together, their Bulldogs finished as the NCAA Tournament runner-up in 2010 and again in 2011.

“Shelvin’s a special guy to me, obviously,” Stevens said. “He’s a guy [for whom] it wasn’t easy early in the league. He’s not a guy that you would’ve said was a for-sure NBA player coming out of high school. In fact, you probably would’ve said, ‘I’d be surprised [if he reaches the NBA].’ But the amount of work that he put in and how committed he is to the game is why he’s where he’s at, and he’s really transformed himself into a point [guard]. When he was playing for us [at Butler], he was playing mostly off the ball and [was] scoring because we needed him to score. But he’s a great competitor. He’s a really good guy. And I’m happy for him that he’s here.”

Layups

• A moment of silence was held before the national anthem to honor the victims of Sunday morning’s mass shooting at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas.

• Gordon led the Magic in points (18) and rebounds (12).

• Vucevic finished with 13 points, 10 rebounds and a team-high seven assists. The double-double was the 200th of Vucevic’s career.

At least that’s what the Heat hope amid this 2-3 start, that such concerns have moved into the past tense, after a team meeting prior to Sunday’s practice at AmericanAirlines Arena.

“Every season is different,” guard Goran Dragic said. “Every season, it’s not like we expected to have immediately that chemistry like we finished the season.”

So the players hashed it out in real and raw terms.

“We had our discussions this morning,” forward James Johnson said. “We aired it out this morning. A lot of people took heat. I think it was the best thing for us to do, even more important than film. That’s what this culture is about, that’s what we’re about — staring guys in the eyes, telling guys the truth and that’s how you show you really love somebody.”

So they shared the love, in a somewhat visceral manner.

“We made a great step in the right direction today,” forward Justise Winslow said, with last season’s 11-30 start a haunting memory. “I mean it’s a concern of ours, but it’s not the end of the world.”

What Johnson said can’t happen is maintaining an ongoing Hassan Whiteside Watch, with the center having missed the past four games with a bone bruise on his left knee.

“We’re going to keep fighting through it and figure out ways to win without him, because you never know, it’s a long season. You never know … he might be out the rest of the season or he could be out a couple more games,” he said, exaggerating the possibilities as a way of making his point. “But we need to figure it out now.”

Coach Erik Spoelstra said Whiteside was limited to non-contact work Sunday, terming him “very doubtful” for Monday’s game against the visiting Minnesota Timberwolves, the fifth game on this season-longest six-game homestand.

“We’d like to get him some contact,” Spoelstra said of the optimal plan before a Whiteside return, “but this was a good step.

“He certainly is making progress. That’s why we’re all encouraged, just to see him down here. He’s working, he’s jumping, he’s running, and hopefully there’s no pain tomorrow.”

Spoelstra also attempted to put perspective on the pain that led to Sunday’s team meeting.

“Every season’s different,” he said. “I love all the emotions that players go through. I don’t even care if it boils over. It means you care. And our guys in the locker room really care.

“This is not the type of start that our group wanted. You can’t guarantee anything in this league.”

The element that the Heat pride themselves on, and acknowledge has been missing, is intensity.

“That doesn’t mean we’re not working harder than everybody,” Johnson said. “That’s doesn’t mean we’re not the most physical. That just means that we’re not applying more effort. There’s got to be more effort to it.

“We all got to play with a chip on our shoulder. And we also all got to play with that edge again. We’re losing who we were and who we are. And that can’t happen on this team.”

Dragic said he did not regret his Saturday postgame comments comparing last season’s opening struggles to the current predicament.

“That’s why we addressed this so early,” he said. “We feel like everybody is on the same page now. We know what we need to do, as long as we put some work in. That’s why we had this meeting.

“On the floor, we don’t talk much and I think that’s a problem, because you need to be comfortable to say, ‘You need to be on the help side,’ ‘You need to do this for me.’ The list goes on and on.”

The grievances have been aired. Seventy-seven games remain.

“Guys were honest today,” Winslow said, “just opening up and being vulnerable and letting it all out there, not holding anything in. It can go a long way in this league — that honesty and connection part.”